Chicago ? Luol Deng’s steady-as-a-metronome scoring last season helped him reach double figures in 78 of the Chicago Bulls’ 82 games. When Deng let fly with an open mid-range jumper, the surprise came when he missed.

Ben Gordon scored more than 20 points 53 times last season, surpassed 30 on 15 occasions and 40 three times.

Kirk Hinrich shot a career-best 44.8 percent last season and played so well on defense that NBA coaches picked him second-team all-defense.

As the Bulls have struggled to an 0-3 start, their so-called core is getting torched defensively and turning the ball over with shocking consistency. Worse, all three players look lost and appear to lack confidence on offense.

“Well, then, you print that,” coach Scott Skiles said. “I didn’t say that.”

Agreeing with at least the lost part, Hinrich did.

“We aren’t playing with any kind of composure on offense,” he said. “We’re helter-skelter. We need to do a better job of playing together and moving the ball. It seems like we’re rushing a lot. The more we miss, the more we rush.”

But like a construction-marred Edens Expressway, the Bulls are going nowhere fast offensively. They’re shooting 37.8 percent, a major contributor to the poor start. There’s more than enough blame to go around. But plenty of it rests with Deng, Gordon and Hinrich, who own 31 of the Bulls’ 51 turnovers.

Gordon is averaging a team-high 22.3 points but is shooting just 38.6 percent and 34.8 on three-pointers.

Deng is next at 13.3 points and is shooting 42.5 percent, far below his career mark of 48 percent.

It’s impossible not to wonder if Deng’s and Gordon’s struggles are related to their decisions to turn down multimillion-dollar contract extensions and their mention in frequent Kobe Bryant trade rumors.Both players continue to offer the right words. But with confirmation that Deng turned down an increased five-year offer worth nearly $57.5 million, speculation about regrets is legitimate.

“The contract and the trade rumors, I try to focus on my game,” Deng said. “I don’t want to blame me struggling on something like that. When I’m on the floor, I’m supposed to produce. And I haven’t done that the last two games.”

Said Gordon: “In the NBA, there are distractions all the time. You have to play through those. You can’t let them get in your head and affect your game. When you’re on the court, that’s the only time you can block everything out. We have to play, have fun and work hard.”

Not surprisingly, Skiles rejected any notion of excuse-making.

“There has to be a point and time where regardless of the stage, you just bring it as a pro every night the same way,” he said.